Charles Sherrington won the Nobel Prize in 1932, shared with his friend and colleague Edgar Douglas Adrian, for their "discoveries regarding the functions of neurons". Sherrington himself coined the words 'neuron' and 'synapse', and said he envisioned the brain as "an enchanted loom."

By removing large portions of the brains of living cats, dogs, monkeys, and apes, he was able to show that neurons are connected through synapses, which had previously been only a theory. He studied under noted bacteriologist Robert Koch, and his own students included neurosurgeon Harvey Cushing and future Nobel Prize winners John Carew Eccles, Sir Howard Florey, and Ragnar Granit.

Sherrington also studied the spinal cord, perception, reaction and behavior, the pyramidal tract that connects the brain and spinal cord, and nerve supply for muscles. His remarkably complete Integrative Action of the Nervous System was for many years a definitive volume of neurology and psychology, held in respect comparable to Isaac Newton's Principia in physics. He is also remembered for what is called Sherrington's Law: For every activated neuron of a muscle, there is a corresponding inhibition of the opposing muscle.